On the ocean side the power of the Sultan has been already limited to Zanzibar and adjacent islands, and it is now like the last flicker of a wasted candle. On the Zambezi, and north of it, up the Shire to Lake Nyassa, come the claims of Portugal. Portugal is weak, and a poor colonizer at that. She can be ousted by diplomacy or sat down upon by force. The German and Italian interests will eventually blend with those of Great Britain, or shape themselves into well-defined states, pledged to peace and anxious to be let alone.
England is well equipped for this gigantic undertaking. She has an extensive South African and Egyptian experience. She has her experience in India, which she need but repeat in Africa to realize her dreams, or at least achieve more than would be possible with any other power. And then India is over-populated. It might be that thousands, perhaps millions, of her people would swarm to African shores, where they would find a climate not unlike their own, and resources which they could turn to ready account. At any rate, England could enlist in India an army for the occupation of East Africa. Her Indian contingent in Egypt answered an excellent purpose, and redeemed the otherwise fatal campaign toward Khartoum.
The business of establishing an internal economy in this new empire is easier for Great Britain than any other country. Her prestige means as much with native tribes as with the petty sovereignties of Europe, or the islands of the Pacific. Her shows of force are impressive, her methods of discipline effective. In the midst of opposition her hand is hard and heavy. A string of fortifications from the Zambezi to Cairo, with native garrisons, under control of English army officers, would inspire the natives with fear and assure their allegiance. The tact of her traders and the perseverance of her missionaries would bring about all else that might be necessary to create a thrifty and semi-Christian State.
Our posterity will watch with interest the development of Africa through the agency of its Congo Free State on the west, and its
Imperial State on the east; the one contributing to the glory of all civilized nations, the other to that of a single nation; the one an enlargement of sovereignty, the other a concentration of it. One has for its inspiration the genius of freedom, the other the genius of force. One is a dedication to civilizing influences, the other is a seizure and appropriation in the name of civilization. We can conceive of the latter, under the impetus of patronage and of concentrated energy, supplemented by arbitrary power, taking the lead for a time, and maintaining it till its viceroyalties become centers of corruption and its subjects helpless peons. But in the end, the former will bound to the front, lifted by internal forces, which are free and virile, buoyed by a spirit of self-helpfulness and independence, sustained from without by universal sympathy and admiration, and from within by beings who have voluntarily consented and contributed to their progress and enlightenment, and are proud participants in their own institutions.
The historian of a century hence will confirm or deny the above observations. If he confirms them, he will add that long experience proved the inutility of forcing our governments, usages and peoples on those of Africa without modification, and to the utter subordination of those which were native; but that, on the contrary, the best civilizing results were obtained by recognition of native elements, their gradual endowment with sovereignty, their elevation to the trusts which commerce and industry impose. It is time that our boasted civilization should show a conquest which is not based on the inferiority, wreck and extermination of the races it meets with in its course. It has careered around the globe in temperate belts, stopping for nothing that came in its way, justifying everything by its superiority. Nature calls a halt in mid-Africa, and practically says: “The agents of civilization are already here. Use them, but do not abuse. You can substitute no other that will prove either permanent or profitable.”
FRONT. TIPPOO TIB’S GRAND CANOES GOING DOWN THE CONGO.